Marco v The Forces of Weird
by G. Lohr
Summary: The Pines family returns to Gravity Falls and find a strange new visitor.
1. Chapter 1

The creature was almost too horrifying to look at; an incomprehensible tangle of tentacles risen from the ocean depths. It battered the Stan o' War relentlessly, having already destroyed almost half of it. Stan shouted a battle cry as he ran at it, slashing and stabbing with the harpoon. He must have hit a soft spot, because his stab drew an ear-splitting scream from the thing. He lost his weapon as he covered his ears and dropped to the deck, barely avoiding another tentacle swipe.

"Damn... Ford! You got that repellent yet?" He shouted to be heard over the beast and the storm that came with it.

Ford's words were scrambled, but he was running up from below with a vial of something bright yellow. Stan quickly got up to continue wrestling with the thing. He tried his best to keep it away from his brother. Ford probably had some ingenious way to beat it, smart guy just needed some time. That was always the deal: Stan punched monsters in the face until Ford finished whatever magic/science/alchemy he needed to resolve the situation.

Stan was usually pretty good at it. Which was why he was surprised to be knocked down. Darn thing fought dirty. A sharp pain shot through his side when it made contact with the deck. "My hip! I can't- Ford!"

Ford was running to him, but was caught by a slimy appendage. Stan struggled to get back up, to grab his brother.

"Stanley!" Ford called as he was dragged into the ocean.

"Stanley!" as he was pulled through the air toward the dimensional portal under the Mystery Shack.

"Stanley!", as Ford shrank away in the distance, trapped by Bill's prison.

"Stanley?"

Stan immediately sat up in his bed, grabbing the man in front of him "No!" His eyes took a moment to focus, "Ford? You're a-" Stan's eyes darted around, he relaxed his grip on his brother, and spoke more slowly, "…here… Why are you in my cabin?"

"I heard you talking in your sleep," Ford explained, "I thought you were having another nightmare."

Stan grumbled under his breath "So what if I was?", he stalked to the dresser to dig out his clothes for the day, "It's ok. I don't need you to keep mothering me, Ford. Everything's fine."

Everything was not fine, and they both knew it. Ford knew better than to comfort his brother directly, though. He just watched him, frowning slightly, eyes soft.

"Yeesh," Stan turned around and started to get dressed, "you look like you're about to cry." When he finished, he found Ford in the same place, making the same face as before. They just stared at each other for a while, in a silent contest. It was a mental fight over who would have to talk first, or leave the room.

Finally, Stan sighed, and rubbed the bridge of his nose, "OK. Ford, I don't think we can keep this up. It's a young man's game, and we're… well … not."

Ford looked down at his hands, shakily flexed and extended his fingers. He winced at the small pain it produced. Having extra fingers didn't help one avoid arthritis. "You may be right. But… we can't just give up."

Stan knew what Ford's objections would be, and so jumped right into them. "'What about our dream to sail around the world, and look at everything left to learn', right? Well that don't mean squat if one of these excursions ends up with you dead. You're the only brother I got, I don't wanna lose you AGAIN" they shared a look. They'd been through enough to know every possible meaning of that phrase, "This time, it'd probably drive me completely insane."

Ford let out a small chuckle, and after a moment of thought, his eyes glittered, and he smiled a wide grin, "I think I may have an acceptable compromise."

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

"Where do you think you're going?! I'm not done arguing with you."

"Yea, well, I'm done with you." he pulled out a wicked looking pair of scissors and cut into the air.

"Marco... I..." the princess of Mewni frowned, her eyes filling with tears, her cheekmarks fading to gray.

Marco didn't turn around, just stared at the swirling vortex before him. It was different from the other's he'd made, but he didn't notice, he wasn't really looking at anything. It was as if he couldn't see anything. He only spoke one word, quietly, "Goodbye." and stepped through.

More out of habit than any urgent necessity, Marco closed the portal behind him almost immediately. When he looked around, he found himself in the middle of a forest.

"Where am I?" no one answered, the only sounds were birds and wind, "At least I've got the space I wanted..." Marco sighed, picked a direction, and started walking. The portal should have taken him to Earth, so he wasn't worried about monsters or demons coming out of nowhere. He just needed to get away from all the ... Mewni.

An hour later, Marco was still stomping through the forest, grumbling about an inconsiderate, ungrateful, magic princess. He barely noticed the shadows lengthening, and the forest getting darker. Whimsical tweets and woodpecker knocks were slowly replaced by snarling and chattering noises, owl hoots and distant howls. "Creepy," Marco shivered, rethinking his idea to 'just start walking'. He got out his phone, maybe he could just call someone, or use the GPS.

A nearby bush began to rustle before he could check. Strange growls got steadily louder as the rustling intensified. Marco got ready to run or fight, it could be anything.

A rabbit hopped out from under the foliage, and Marco sighed in relief. "Oh yea," he said, a little embarrassed, "Earth doesn't have evil monsters." he crouched down to inspect the fluffy thing, "Hey little guy,"

Suddenly, the rabbit grew huge, and snarled at Marco, showing all of it's large, pointy teeth. It was so surprising, Marco shouted and fell over backwards. He instinctively got back up to fighting stance, watching the creature closely. He was ready to redirect it, but the rabbit was caught mid-leap by a gray blur.

It was hard to see through the confusion and fighting, but Marco was pretty sure that was a man-sized wolf clawing and biting at the rabbit monster. Before Marco could fully process what was going on, a high screech echoed through the trees. It seemed to force everything to freeze, rabbit and wolf included. The wolf raised it's muzzle, sniffing the air, then turned his glowing gaze to Marco. "RUN"

Marco didn't think, he ran. It barely felt like a voluntary decision. He bolted through the forest as questions ran through his mind. 'Earth doesn't have monsters, how did they get here? where am I?' he slowed down, as he began to wonder if he was truly on Earth.

He stopped by a tree to catch his breath, trying to think. He didn't see anything following him, and the creepy noises were far off. "That's it, this place is too weird." he took his scissors out, "Do I need to be more specific with you?... ok, take me home."

He cut open a portal and jumped through, only to be thrown back out. He tried again, and was thrown back again. He opened three portals at once, and none of them worked. Each time he tried, his frustration and confusion grew. "No no NO! Why isn't this working?"

Finally, he got tired from trying, exhausted after falling backwards and shouting at the sky about five dozen times. He leaned against a tree and slid down to the ground. "As if things couldn't get worse. Now I can't even go home. ... Why are you broken!?"

... ... ... ... ... ... ...

"We're close. Get ready."

The strange voice woke Marco from his nap.

"You sure you don't want to wait?"

Two people, probably hunting for something, probably not expecting to find him there. Marco took a few seconds to decide on a hiding place before hustling up the tree. Below, he saw to people, kids about his own age. They looked very much alike, aside from the girl being several inches taller than the boy. The boy was carying some kind of tablet. "I don't understand," he said, "It should be right here."

The girl looked relieved, and heaved a big sigh, "See, everything's fine. No weird weirdness, just... normal... weirdness."

"I dunno... We should check around. If there's a chance of more dimension rifts, we could have another Wierdmaggedon on our hands, or worse!"

The girl looked terribly serious then. Marco hadn't noticed how bright she was until that light dimmed. Like Star... He almost let them move on, but he had to at least find out where he was. "Wait." he called as he dropped out of the tree, "It was me."

The boy stepped forward slowly, looking from the tablet to Marco and back again. Now that he got a closer look, Marco noticed that had extra bits and antennae attached. The boy studied the display a little longer before speaking "Who...or what... are you?"

Surprising, but not the most surprising thing that had happened to Marco that day. "Um... well, my name is Marco. I'm a human... from Earth"

The two kids looked at each other, the girl shrugged, and the the boy asked "You said 'it was me'. What do you mean? How did you get here?"

"You were tracking down dimensional portals, right?" he pulled out his scissors, "I came here from Mewni, and I've been trying to get home, but these don't seem to be working right." The kids still looked confused, so a demonstration was in order. He tried to focus on where he wanted to go, the same way he did every other time, and cut a portal open. "Maybe.. 61st time is the charm?" He stepped through, only to be bounced back again, with a big frown.

The response from the other two was more than wide-eyed surprise, they were afraid. Marco'd never seen anyone this terrified of dimension-jumping. He quickly closed it, "See? Broken. Been closing them anyway, can't leave these things unsupervised, y'know... like toddlers."

The strange boy nodded, and held out his hand, "I understand. Can I see those?"

Hesitantly, Marco handed them over. If they didn't work, there wasn't any point to holding on to them. "Uh... okay... So, where am I anyway? and who are you?"

"Ooh! Introductions!" the girl squealed brightly, "My name's Mabel, and this is my twin brother, Dipper. This is Gravity Falls."

"Gravity... Falls... ok... either of you know how I can get back to Earth?"

Mabel snickered, and an 8-bit tune sounded from Dipper's pocket. After checking his phone, he put everything, including Marco's scissors, in his backpack. He grabbed Marco's arm before he could protest.

"We need to get back to the shack, sort this out later," he turned to Mabel, "They're here."


	2. Chapter 2

Author's notes:

I hope nobody is looking for excellent literature here. It's mostly stream of consciousness writing. I'm not expecting this to get famous or anything, just trying to practice some writing.

"Dudes!" Soos waved from the back porch of the Mystery Shack. He was still wearing the Mr. Mystery outfit. "They're unpacking downstairs. Super stoked to see you… … Who's your friend?"

Dipper didn't like to waste time explaining things, "Did you tell them where we went?"

"Oh, no way, dudes." Soos replied. He'd come to accept the fact Dipper didn't normally answer his questions. He could always ask Mabel later.

"C'mon Mabel," he dragged a mildly protesting Marco into the Mystery Shack. Mabel gave Soos a smile and a wave to let him know everything was ok as she followed them inside.

Once they were inside, Dipper loosened his grip a bit, and Marco was able to pull his arm away. "Hey, what's the big idea? Give me back my scissors."

Dipper backed away from him, "I'm not letting you bring him back!"

"Bring who back?" Dipper didn't respond, so Marco put on a more serious tone, "I didn't come here to hurt you. But if I have to fight you to get home…"

Mabel came between the two boys, but before she could say anything, a voice sounded from farther inside the house. "Dipper?" the deep, rough voice asked.

They could hear footsteps coming closer, and another voice, a little softer than the first, "What's going on up there?" Marco hoped he could reason with these people, at least there would now be adults around to help handle the situation.

When the men burst into the foyer, one was aiming a strange-looking gun, and the other was brandishing brass knuckles. They looked reasonably formidable, especially for old guys. Everyone was silent for a moment, until Dipper and Mabel shouted, "Grunkles!"

The two old men responded with "Kids!" they ran into each other, holding onto a big group hug for a long minute.

It was a beautiful family moment. Until Marco remembered they were holding his property hostage. He cleared his throat to get their attention. The two old guys looked at him, then down at Dipper and Mabel.

The gruff one put his brass knuckles in his pocket, "So, uh, you gonna introduce us to your new friend, 'ere?"

"More introductions!" Mabel sang, "Grunkle Stan, Great Uncle Ford: this is Marco, he's got magic scissors. Marco, this is our Grunkle Stan and his twin brother, Ford. They are the bravest and smartest man in Gravity Falls, respectively."

Marco held his head in disbelief, "More twins? What kind of crazy dimension is this?"

.. … … … …

There were a lot of explanations and questions flying around that night. Marco tried to sleep on it, but was still confused the next morning. They'd promised to feed him breakfast, so he decided to wait until he had some sustenance before asking anything more.

Marco stared at his mug of tea until he'd made a coherent sentence in his head, "So, this place has werewolves, giant rabbits, and gnomes, but we're still on Earth?"

"Yup" Dipper replied, in between mouthfuls of pancake.

Marco sipped his drink, "And my scissors won't work right because of some formula Ford cooked up?"

"He didn't 'cook it up'," Mabel supplied, complete with air quotes, "he discovered it."

"Right..." Marco turned to Ford, who was busy serving up more pancakes, "so when can I have my dimensional scissors back? Once I leave town, they should start working again. I mean, if I'm out of range of this … weirdness magnet?"

"Those scissors of yours are fascinating." Ford mused, "I'd heard of quantum edges in theory, but never imagined I'd see them in practice. Real life dimensional scissors…"

"Oh yea," Dipper piped in, "I put an entry in my journal about it already."

"But, I am gonna get 'em back, right?" Marco liked these folks, they seemed nice. He really didn't want to pull out his karate moves to get his stuff back.

"Come on guys," Mabel said, "you can't just steal his stuff"

"But I want to know how it works." Dipper pouted.

"Indeed, it is a wonder of the world that requires more study." Ford agreed, "Besides, dimensional portals are extremely dangerous, I'm not sure we can leave them in the hands of some random teenager."

"I am NOT a random teenager!" Nobody could tell Marco he didn't deserve those scissors, "I chased Heckapoo for sixteen years to get those, and I haven't used them irresponsibly once. I defended Star Butterfly from Ludo's army, and started the revolution at St. O's. It is dangerous, I know how dangerous it is, but I know exactly how to use it!"

Everyone was speechless for a while. Stan spoke up first. "I don't understand half of what you just said, but I agree with Mabel. … I'm gonna go see how the gift shop is doing." All that arguing was getting to be too much for Stan, and he really didn't want to get in the middle of the genius debate.

"I think we all just need to calm down." Mabel said. She took a deep breath and looked expectantly around until everyone else had taken a breath as well. "See? That's better, isn't it? Ok. Great Uncle Ford, come sit down."

Ford sat with them, but looked dubious, "Mabel, I'm not sure-"

"Shush!" Mabel said, sticking a finger up to Ford's lips, "This is Mabel mediation time!" He looked at Dipper, Dipper nodded, and Ford leaned back in his seat, calm and silent.

Mabel smiled "Thank you." She folded her hands in front of her, and turned toward Marco, "Now, you need to go home. I'm sure we can all appreciate that. The Pines know how much home and family mean to everyone. But you don't want to leave without your prized possession." she turned to address Ford and Dipper, "You two, with your insatiable need to unlock the mysteries of the universe, want to study Marco's thing. You need more time with it to understand how it works." She leaned back to look at all of them, "Have I got it right so far?" Everyone nodded.

"I didn't realize how eloquent your sister was." Ford whispered

"She had a lot of practice."

"OK" Mabel tapped her index fingers together and stared at the ceiling as she thought, "Marco, when do you need to get home? Is it urgent? Can you call to let them know you'll be late?"

Marco chuckled nervously, "Well, I…" he considered lying, but for some reason felt like that wouldn't work on her anyway, "My parents aren't really expecting me back for a while. I had to leave early… personal issues."

Mabel nodded, "So if you were to stay here for, say, a week, they wouldn't be worried about you?"

Marco shrugged, "I guess not."

"Good." Mabel turned back to the Pines, "You guys think you'll be done messing with his stuff in a week?"

"um… sure" Dipper nodded hesitantly, looking to Ford for approval.

Ford seemed to be thinking very hard on it, "Yes, that's probably for the best anyway. The longer it stays here, the more chance it has to make trouble."

"Great!" Mabel clapped her hands together, "Marco will stay here for a week and help you guys study his… 'quantum edge'. But, after the week is up, you have to give him his scissors back, and pay his bus fare home, or at least out of Oregon."

Everyone nodded agreement, and Mabel jumped up, throwing confetti in the air. "SOLVED! …. Phew, mediating really drains the energy. I'm gonna go do some silly stuff with Waddles. Have fun you guys, no more fighting!"

Mabel ran off, leaving Marco and Ford dumbfounded. Dipper, however, had gotten used to this already, and grinned, "Impressive, right? She always liked to make people happy. I guess she learned some negotiating skills from all those parties. Constantly trying to make sure everyone was having a good time."

"Yea," Marco said, "She's great."

… … … … … … …

After a prolonged game of 200 Questions with Ford and Dipper, Marco needed to get away from this awkward Pines family. Mabel suggested he go into town to meet other people. It didn't seem like a bad idea.

He went to the kitchen to get some snacks for the road, and found Stan rummaging about in the fridge. The old guy seemed a little apathetic, but he was nice enough to dig out a bag of beef jerky for Marco.

He got barely halfway to town when he heard something crashing through the woods. He sighed, re-sealing his bag of jerky, "What now?"

The beast was ten feet tall, had the legs and head of a bull, but torso and arms of a man. It roared, reaching its fists into the air. "JErrrrkyyyy!"

Marco stood ready to fight, but cocked his head in confusion, "What?"

"Beef Jerky! You have some, I want it." He was shouting every sentence.

"Um… no."

The minotaur charged, yelling a battle cry. Marco grinned and easily sidestepped this first attack. As he suspected, his opponent was a sloppy fighter, relying on his greater size and strength rather than skill.

Defeating the creature ended up being a trivial task. He redirected punches and leapt over charges. After attempting some strikes, he discovered the minotaur was super tough, so he started looking for a boulder or tree he could push the creature into. Luckily, they were in a forest, and there were large trees everywhere.

Marco found one particularly sturdy tree, and taunted the beast into another charge. It ran right into the tree and got tangled in its branches. Marco waved, walking away with his bag of snacks.

"Stupid tiny human!" the minotaur shouted after him, "I will- grr" he struggled with the tree, "You weakling! I will crush you! REVENGE!"

Fighting a monster actually made Marco feel better. It was normal for him, and all he'd needed was something normal as a break from this weird place. If he wanted to go into town, it might be better to get a ride instead of walking.

When he got back to the shack, he found Mabel outside, playing fetch with her pig. "Hey," she called out cheerily "that was quick. How was-?" she noticed his hoodie was a little torn up, "Did … something happen?"

"Not much," Marco answered, reaching for another piece of jerky, "did you know there are minotaur in this forest too?"

Mabel smiled, patting Marco's shoulder, "Manotaur. We have a pack of manotaur."

"oh" Marco said between chewing, "of course."

Waddles ambled over, prompting a pat from Mabel, but she still looked concerned, "So… did the manotaur say anything interesting?"

"Say? He didn't really say much at all. He wanted to fight me for my beef jerky."

They walked together to the back porch, and came to rest on the couch. "Yea, they're kinda agro," Mabel said, grunting with the effort of lifting Waddles into her lap. "then what?"

"Well, we fought and I won." Marco stared out at the yard "It actually made me feel a lot better. I used to fight monsters all the time, so it was kind of like things were back to normal."

"That sounds like fun," Mabel said "He didn't do anything weird like swear eternal revenge, right?"

FOOTNOTE

I'll probably finish this in one or two more chapters. If you want more, let me know. I only went this far because the story acquired some followers.


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